Unsolved: The Boy Who Disappeared (2016) s01e05 Episode Script
The CCTV
PHONE RECORDING: Can you give me details of what happened in Cowes High Street the night that Damien Nettles was murdered? Yes.
A group of males and one female came rolling out of Sun Hill as though it was like a a posse entering a cowboy town.
Nicky McNamara was doing windmills, spinning around.
These are the words of our source, The Weatherman.
He's given us evidence that convicted drug dealer Nicky McNamara may have been behind Damien's disappearance.
We're trying to establish The Weatherman's credibility by corroborating his account of the night Damien went missing.
RECORDING: This was around about 11.
30, 11.
40.
11.
30 to 11.
45.
Yeah.
And eranyway, then this car came along and it was a police car, and it pulled up outside Yorkies.
Directly outside the chip shop.
Two women got out the back of the car and some more coppers came along.
There was something like in the region of about three or four coppers.
This is the night that Damien disappeared.
At the same time The Weatherman says police were present on Cowes High Street, around 11.
30, the camera in Yorkies records this conversation between customers.
That gives The Weatherman some credibility.
There could well have been a police car outside Yorkies.
But what about his claim that Nicky McNamara was on Cowes High Street that night? RECORDING: I said, "You all right, Nicky? "Shouldn't you be off your face or something?" To prove that, we need footage from the CCTV cameras on the high street.
Footage that could also show exactly what happened to Damien after he left the chippy.
Do you remember Yorkies there? Yeah, I do.
'In the days after Damien disappeared, 'the police showed Val some of this footage.
'It captured images of her son.
' This is the last sighting of him here, Val, isn't it? It would've been under that.
So, to me, this is the bracket.
Yeah.
You can just slightly see, you know, his face and he's holding chips and just walking this way.
Last known sighting.
He's never seen anywhere ever again.
I feel very .
.
sad.
You just must find it incredibly hard to believe that he just disappeared without a trace.
Without a trace.
Not one person can tell me, nobody, after everybody saw him, nonstop for what, an hour or more on this high street and then he gets to that one spot and he vanishes off the face of the Earth.
He's never seen here, he's not seen anywhere, nowhere.
Nowhere at all.
Just not on the face of the Earth any more.
But here's the thing - Val was only shown a small section of this street's CCTV footage by the police.
We would like to get all of the footage for our investigation.
He couldn't have come this way because this camera would have picked him up from that point there.
Rod is a local businessman who used to manage the high street's CCTV recordings.
The Business Association were paying for these.
We had the minimum amount of cameras to cover that we could.
I'm absolutely certain there were seven cameras.
He says he handed all the footage to the police in the days after Damien went missing.
They said, "We need to take this away to enhance it," so we got the policeman at the time to sign and put his number in the book and I countersigned the book.
Weeks, probably even months later, when the police came back and said they wanted to view the tape again, and I said to the policeman, "But you've never brought the tape back," and they said, "Oh, yes, we have.
" I said, "But you haven't.
" So I said, "Well, let's look in the book," so we looked in the book and there was no counter signature reverse procedure.
For it to come back in.
For it to come back and they said, "Well, you must have lost it.
" I said, "No, no, no, no.
No, I know what I'm doing.
"I've been doing it for long enough.
" And really, that's the last I heard of it.
The cops lose the tape.
The mind boggles.
You take a tape, you seize the tape, you give it an exhibit number, you send it for a copy, you get stills.
No, but what did happen? Like, how did they lose it? It's lost.
They just lost it.
That is gutting.
For Valerie.
But also, I mean, how valuable would that be to know who's on that street, Bronagh? You know, if this is the last time that young fella is seen, you want to know who he's kicking around with, if anyone.
Hard evidence lost by police.
Evidence that could prove what happened to Damien on the high street that night, including whether he ran into Nicky McNamara.
But just how did this happen? It was friends of the Nettles who first tracked down the footage after Damien went missing.
Valerie asked if she could view it.
The police officer in charge of the footage agreed.
We were set up to have no expectation of this, you know, video of being of any value.
It couldn't hold it up in court, you couldn't tell who they were and it was rubbish and it wasn't worth having.
And he said, "And I've had my officer down here "going through 11 hours of video.
" And I said, "Well, let's see it.
" And so I go through and they had tracked the wrong person.
"That's not my son.
" "Oh.
Oh, OK.
" So we had to look and stand there for a long time until we did see him.
And we did see him.
I can't tell you how delighted I was that I saw my son on that video.
Just for security's sake, they should've just wrapped it up and taken it somewhere.
But that's not what happened.
The same police officer who showed Val the footage says he left the tape in the viewing machine.
He says the tape was later recorded over.
Damien.
Damien.
I could be watching that video, I could watch it a million times over and over again just to see the last footsteps that I'll ever see of my child.
You know, the last little picture of just the side of his face on that camera.
That A-hole says there's nothing of valueon there.
I could I honestly That man destroyed every possible last moment that I could've maybe have got some answers.
Hampshire Police have apologised to the Nettles family for losing the street CCTV footage.
I don't feel the police have wanted to solve it or felt like they were going to solve it from day one.
It was about a week and a half, two weeks before we got any detectives came by and then we realised that they were wasting time looking at us and I'd call them up and say, "Have you heard anything yet? Do you know of anything?" "No, Mrs Nettles, not unless you've got something to tell us.
" "Well, what would I have to tell you? If I knew it, I'd tell you.
" Oh.
No.
No.
It was bad.
It sounds as raw today as it was then, Val.
Yeah, well, it's just You know, Damien he could have needed me.
He could have needed us and we weren't there for him.
There was no help for him, whatever it was.
There's no help.
Hampshire Police say they began searches for Damien the day after he went missing.
They say they've since reviewed thousands of documents, taken hundreds of witness statements and made eight arrests.
'No suspects have been charged, but the case remains open to new leads 'and experienced detectives are assigned.
'Hampshire Police have previously offered 'a reward for information about Damien's location, 'but they say this did not deliver any credible new leads.
' You all right? 'They caution against the repetition of rumours in this case 'at the expense of facts.
' No, this just brings back some nasty memories coming up these steps.
I bet it does.
'Valerie is going to meet the officer now in charge 'of the case for an update.
' My brother and my sister.
Guys, I'll see you when you get out, OK? Thanks.
All right? 'We wanted to film this meeting, but the police refused.
'They also refused our repeated requests for an interview.
' What did she tell you about the status of the case now? Well, she said it's still ongoing, active, right? Is it murder or is it missing? No, she said it's never been a murder case.
What? She said that the status of the case is the same as it ever was, it's a missing persons case and it never was anything other than a missing persons case.
Tell me, was there anything of significance that you learned today that made you think it's positive? I couldn't say that there was.
Do you think that there's any energy coming from police? No.
Any energy towards actively solving this case one way or another? No.
They tell me stuff and I come away feeling like it'sit's nothing and all I can do is go back and say the same thing and it's on deaf ears, because if they'd done it right in the first place, I wouldn't be here now.
My whole life's been turned upside because of these stupid people who couldn't do this right in the first place.
A group of males and one female came rolling out of Sun Hill as though it was like a a posse entering a cowboy town.
Nicky McNamara was doing windmills, spinning around.
These are the words of our source, The Weatherman.
He's given us evidence that convicted drug dealer Nicky McNamara may have been behind Damien's disappearance.
We're trying to establish The Weatherman's credibility by corroborating his account of the night Damien went missing.
RECORDING: This was around about 11.
30, 11.
40.
11.
30 to 11.
45.
Yeah.
And eranyway, then this car came along and it was a police car, and it pulled up outside Yorkies.
Directly outside the chip shop.
Two women got out the back of the car and some more coppers came along.
There was something like in the region of about three or four coppers.
This is the night that Damien disappeared.
At the same time The Weatherman says police were present on Cowes High Street, around 11.
30, the camera in Yorkies records this conversation between customers.
That gives The Weatherman some credibility.
There could well have been a police car outside Yorkies.
But what about his claim that Nicky McNamara was on Cowes High Street that night? RECORDING: I said, "You all right, Nicky? "Shouldn't you be off your face or something?" To prove that, we need footage from the CCTV cameras on the high street.
Footage that could also show exactly what happened to Damien after he left the chippy.
Do you remember Yorkies there? Yeah, I do.
'In the days after Damien disappeared, 'the police showed Val some of this footage.
'It captured images of her son.
' This is the last sighting of him here, Val, isn't it? It would've been under that.
So, to me, this is the bracket.
Yeah.
You can just slightly see, you know, his face and he's holding chips and just walking this way.
Last known sighting.
He's never seen anywhere ever again.
I feel very .
.
sad.
You just must find it incredibly hard to believe that he just disappeared without a trace.
Without a trace.
Not one person can tell me, nobody, after everybody saw him, nonstop for what, an hour or more on this high street and then he gets to that one spot and he vanishes off the face of the Earth.
He's never seen here, he's not seen anywhere, nowhere.
Nowhere at all.
Just not on the face of the Earth any more.
But here's the thing - Val was only shown a small section of this street's CCTV footage by the police.
We would like to get all of the footage for our investigation.
He couldn't have come this way because this camera would have picked him up from that point there.
Rod is a local businessman who used to manage the high street's CCTV recordings.
The Business Association were paying for these.
We had the minimum amount of cameras to cover that we could.
I'm absolutely certain there were seven cameras.
He says he handed all the footage to the police in the days after Damien went missing.
They said, "We need to take this away to enhance it," so we got the policeman at the time to sign and put his number in the book and I countersigned the book.
Weeks, probably even months later, when the police came back and said they wanted to view the tape again, and I said to the policeman, "But you've never brought the tape back," and they said, "Oh, yes, we have.
" I said, "But you haven't.
" So I said, "Well, let's look in the book," so we looked in the book and there was no counter signature reverse procedure.
For it to come back in.
For it to come back and they said, "Well, you must have lost it.
" I said, "No, no, no, no.
No, I know what I'm doing.
"I've been doing it for long enough.
" And really, that's the last I heard of it.
The cops lose the tape.
The mind boggles.
You take a tape, you seize the tape, you give it an exhibit number, you send it for a copy, you get stills.
No, but what did happen? Like, how did they lose it? It's lost.
They just lost it.
That is gutting.
For Valerie.
But also, I mean, how valuable would that be to know who's on that street, Bronagh? You know, if this is the last time that young fella is seen, you want to know who he's kicking around with, if anyone.
Hard evidence lost by police.
Evidence that could prove what happened to Damien on the high street that night, including whether he ran into Nicky McNamara.
But just how did this happen? It was friends of the Nettles who first tracked down the footage after Damien went missing.
Valerie asked if she could view it.
The police officer in charge of the footage agreed.
We were set up to have no expectation of this, you know, video of being of any value.
It couldn't hold it up in court, you couldn't tell who they were and it was rubbish and it wasn't worth having.
And he said, "And I've had my officer down here "going through 11 hours of video.
" And I said, "Well, let's see it.
" And so I go through and they had tracked the wrong person.
"That's not my son.
" "Oh.
Oh, OK.
" So we had to look and stand there for a long time until we did see him.
And we did see him.
I can't tell you how delighted I was that I saw my son on that video.
Just for security's sake, they should've just wrapped it up and taken it somewhere.
But that's not what happened.
The same police officer who showed Val the footage says he left the tape in the viewing machine.
He says the tape was later recorded over.
Damien.
Damien.
I could be watching that video, I could watch it a million times over and over again just to see the last footsteps that I'll ever see of my child.
You know, the last little picture of just the side of his face on that camera.
That A-hole says there's nothing of valueon there.
I could I honestly That man destroyed every possible last moment that I could've maybe have got some answers.
Hampshire Police have apologised to the Nettles family for losing the street CCTV footage.
I don't feel the police have wanted to solve it or felt like they were going to solve it from day one.
It was about a week and a half, two weeks before we got any detectives came by and then we realised that they were wasting time looking at us and I'd call them up and say, "Have you heard anything yet? Do you know of anything?" "No, Mrs Nettles, not unless you've got something to tell us.
" "Well, what would I have to tell you? If I knew it, I'd tell you.
" Oh.
No.
No.
It was bad.
It sounds as raw today as it was then, Val.
Yeah, well, it's just You know, Damien he could have needed me.
He could have needed us and we weren't there for him.
There was no help for him, whatever it was.
There's no help.
Hampshire Police say they began searches for Damien the day after he went missing.
They say they've since reviewed thousands of documents, taken hundreds of witness statements and made eight arrests.
'No suspects have been charged, but the case remains open to new leads 'and experienced detectives are assigned.
'Hampshire Police have previously offered 'a reward for information about Damien's location, 'but they say this did not deliver any credible new leads.
' You all right? 'They caution against the repetition of rumours in this case 'at the expense of facts.
' No, this just brings back some nasty memories coming up these steps.
I bet it does.
'Valerie is going to meet the officer now in charge 'of the case for an update.
' My brother and my sister.
Guys, I'll see you when you get out, OK? Thanks.
All right? 'We wanted to film this meeting, but the police refused.
'They also refused our repeated requests for an interview.
' What did she tell you about the status of the case now? Well, she said it's still ongoing, active, right? Is it murder or is it missing? No, she said it's never been a murder case.
What? She said that the status of the case is the same as it ever was, it's a missing persons case and it never was anything other than a missing persons case.
Tell me, was there anything of significance that you learned today that made you think it's positive? I couldn't say that there was.
Do you think that there's any energy coming from police? No.
Any energy towards actively solving this case one way or another? No.
They tell me stuff and I come away feeling like it'sit's nothing and all I can do is go back and say the same thing and it's on deaf ears, because if they'd done it right in the first place, I wouldn't be here now.
My whole life's been turned upside because of these stupid people who couldn't do this right in the first place.